Oyi what a title. The Delusions of Von Sottendorff and his Square Mind is the latest game from developer Delirium Studios for Nintendo 3DS. From here on out, for my own sanity, I will simply refer to this game as Square Mind. Speaking of sanity, you play as the titular Baron Von Sottendorff who is simply trying to leave his own home. Sounds easy right? Well the catch here is that the baron thinks he\’s trapped in a grid drawing of his mansion because he\’s lost his mind. My kinda guy.
The main gameplay hook has you rearranging rooms around in order to obtain photographs and other items to help the baron regain his memory. Each stage consists of four rooms with one puzzle piece and one key. The puzzle pieces fit together and help form the baron\’s memory while the key unlocks the door to the next stage. You\’ll also find photographs scattered throughout the stages that are referred to as memories and provide some backstory into the baron\’s life.
If you press the \’L\’ button on the 3DS the stage zooms out and you can use the d-pad to move it left and right in 3D space to help plan your route. As you can see in the photo above every stage is arranged in such a way that there is an open space at any given moment, similar to a sliding puzzle. The puzzles are pretty basic and won’t require you to think too hard. This game won’t win any awards for pushing the 3DS system graphically, but everything has a nice cartoony vibe to it and each world varies from the next which cuts down on repetition. The voice of the narriator took some getting used to as both the soundtrack and voiceover were recorded in 3D with a holophonic system.
Square Mind has 8 worlds each with 5 stages for a total of 40 in all. Depending on your skill level the overall game will take you around five or six hours to complete. Once you complete the game there is very little incentive to play through it again, not that every game needs to be played multiple times. The memories you discover are used as currency to unlock various pieces of music, videos, and game artwork but other than that, there are no hidden levels or extra game modes to conquer. Overall The Delusions of Von Sottendorff and his Square Mind is a pretty solid puzzle game coming from a small indie team and a nice start in the console market. The game is available on the Nintendo 3DS eShop.
